


The Lamb and The Ace

by littleharlequin



Category: BioShock, BioShock Infinite
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-24
Updated: 2015-02-27
Packaged: 2018-02-10 06:52:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2015274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleharlequin/pseuds/littleharlequin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU. Jack Wynand is finally living a quiet life, with the five Little Sisters he rescued from Rapture. That is until, one day, a woman appears on his farm, near death and full of talk about a man called Atlas. Jack/Elizabeth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The morning was bright when Jack awoke. Yellow sunlight streamed in through the crack in his curtains as he sat on the edge of his bed and stretched, relieving the tension that had built up in his muscles overnight. He dressed quickly, pulling on a light shirt, which he rolled to his elbows, and the pair of black work pants he usually wore around the farm, the cuffs of which were frayed and the knees almost worn through.

He made his way to the front door of the farmhouse, though not before checking in on the girls, assuring himself that they were all still sound asleep. Crowded into the larger of the house's two bedrooms, the five girls Jack had rescued from Rapture were still all slumbering in their beds - Cathy, Emily, Masha and Leta, who had somehow ended up sleeping together, hands clasped firmly as they adapted to this new surface world together, and, at the very end, Sally, blonde hair obscuring her features and little fingers curled around her treasured doll.

Jack felt himself smile as he watched them, revelling in the fact that they were sleeping, free of nightmares, for the first time in the month since they'd surfaced. Allowing them another hour's sleep before awakening them for breakfast, he closed the door to their bedroom as quietly as he could and went out into the farm.

The sun was hot despite the early hour and Jack began to feel sweat gathering on his brow as he went about his morning's work. He fed the small herd of cows they'd amassed, collected any eggs from the hen house and mucked out the stable of the old horse, Nelly, that had come with the house. Amongst his  _(fake)_  memories Jack could remember riding a horse in his youth, taking it through the open fields that surrounded his  _(fake)_ home while his  _(fake)_ parents watched on in admiration.

"Look at our boy go," his father hadn't said.

Jack swallowed, shaking his head in an attempt to clear it. Now wasn't the time to dwell on the past, falsified or otherwise - he needed to focus on the present. Old Nelly whinnied as he passed her and he gave the side of her neck an affectionate pat on his way back up to the house. As he approached, he could see that one of the girls was already awake, sitting on the steps of the porch, waiting for him.

"Good morning, Sally," he greeted her once in earshot, throwing the girl a lopsided grin. The words sounded gruff and he tried his best to ignore the stab of pain simply speaking had incurred in his throat. The vocal cord surgery he had underwent to become a Big Daddy had been reversed, though he was still healing - a little bit each day.

"Good morning, Papa Jack," she beamed up at him, as she carefully smoothed out a crease in her doll's dress. Elizabeth, it was called. Sally had christened her as such shortly after arriving on the surface and, when questioned on the choice of title, she had merely shrugged, citing that it sounded like a good sort of name.

He offered his hand to her, which she gleefully accepted, allowing him to help her to her feet. "Let's go wake up the others, shall we?" he suggested, leading her back into the house when she nodded in agreement.

Twenty minutes later, all five girls were awake and seated, in eager anticipation, around the kitchen table as they watched Jack stir the oatmeal one final time before he turned to them, advising them to sit back as he dished it out. No sooner had it filled their bowls did the girls start into their breakfast hungrily, smearing oats and milk all over their faces in their haste to eat. Jack sat at the head of the table, eating his own - smaller - bowl of oatmeal slowly as he surveyed the girls and tended to any requests they had.

"Papa Jack, can I have another glass of milk?"

"Are there any raspberries left, Papa Jack?"

"But, Papa Jack, I'm  _still_  hungry, can't I have some more oatmeal?  _Please_ _?_ "

After breakfast, as with any other day, Jack collected up the empty cups and bowls and stowed them away in the sink, to be washed once he had completed his next task of the morning. Entering their bedroom with them, Jack proceeded to help the girls dress for the day ahead, advising Emily that perhaps today wasn't the best day for her good new dress while simultaneously braiding Masha's hair. He had become a dab hand at braiding hair, he mused with no small amount of pride as he secured the ribbon in place before the plait could become undone.

Once dressed, Jack allowed the girls to go about their own activities for the day - provided, of course, that they didn't wander off the farm. As usual, Cathy and Emily opted to remain inside - Cathy with her crayons and several pieces of paper, Emily with her books. At nearly seven years old, Emily loved books and, while her time as a Little Sister had stunted her education and she wasn't as well-read as many other little girls her age, Jack had been helping her catch up and, each time he ventured into town, he always made sure to bring home a new book for Emily.

"We're going outside!" Masha saw fit to announce on behalf of her and Leta, though it was unsurprising to all those present.

While Cathy and Emily preferred the comfort of the farmhouse, Masha and Leta lived for the openness of the outdoors. At first they had been terrified by it, stricken by agoraphobia after knowing only the confines of Rapture all their lives, but once they had discovered that there were no walls or windows to hold them in, that the sun was nothing to be afraid of, they were enamoured by it and seemed intent on living out their days basking in the light.

"Be careful," Jack warned them, as he did every other morning, a slight twinkle in his eye.

"We will!" the two girls chorused happily before they raced off into the garden, hand in hand.

Jack smiled as he watched them go, shaking his head as Leta fell mere steps out the door before she picked herself up and raced on in a fervent attempt to catch up with Masha, affirming to him that they would have their dresses spoiled by lunchtime. He glanced down when he felt something tug insistently at his pants' leg and he spared Sally a small smile as she gazed up at him, wide-eyed.

"Do you need any help with anything, Papa Jack?" she said and Jack stooped down to pick her up.

"Well," he replied, taking them both into the kitchen, "I could use some help drying the dishes. Do you think you'd be up for that?"

She grinned widely and bobbed her head happily as Jack placed her on the counter top next to the sink, "That's brilliant," he continued as, with a squeak, he turned on the tap, allowing water to pour over the dirty bowls, "Now I'll be sure to get it done twice as fast."

By nine o'clock the dishes were cleaned, dried and put away with only one broken plate detracting from their number. Sally had looked up at Jack, lower lip trembling, as it had fallen from her hands and onto the floor, shattering into five distinct pieces. Jack had hurried to quell her tears before they could be shed, reassuring her that it was only a broken plate, though cautioning her to mind the shards as he cleaned up the mess.

Lifting her down off the counter, Jack took Sally's proffered hand and led her out onto the porch, pausing only to pick up his sewing basket and three of the girls' dresses on his way out. With the sun beating down on them, growing hotter and hotter the closer it drew to noon, Jack settled himself in the battered old rocking chair they'd found stowed away in the attic when they first bought the house. Sally sat cross-legged near his feat as he sewed, patching up holes in Masha and Leta's dresses, while she played imaginary games with her doll.

It was a strange feeling - perhaps, because he had only become accustomed to it as of late - but Jack felt oddly at peace as he expertly guided the needle in and out of the fabric. He was getting better at this, too, he couldn't help but commend himself as he smoothed out the garment to take a look at his handiwork so far. The stitching was neat and straight, nothing like the clumsy affairs that he had produced the first time he attempted a task such as this. He looked at his hands, eyes roaming over the scars left on his wrists from the use of EVE hypos, and he squeezed his eyes shut as memories of Rapture threatened to bubble to the surface.

_Would you kindly. Would you kindly. Would you-_

No.

That wasn't him anymore. By his father's standards, he was a man now - he chose his own path.

He opened his eyes, content at having kept the memories of Rapture safely at bay  _(for now)_ and his brow furrowed in confusion when he saw either Masha or Leta - he couldn't be sure, she was still too far away to be distinguished - bounding up towards them. It was Masha, he determined eventually, when she skidded to a halt in the dirt and gazed up at him with big, frightened eyes.

"Masha, what is it? What's wrong?" Jack asked, rising to his feet, concern welling up in him at the absence of her constant companion, "Where's Leta?"

"She's with the lady," Masha explained, a little breathlessly, and Jack felt a spike of confusion rush through him, "Come on, Papa Jack, we think she's hurt." Masha stumbled forward to grab Jack's hand in both of hers, tugging on it insistently, "We need to help her."

"OK," Jack replied, nodding, "Show me where she is."

Masha bobbed her head furiously, twin braids bouncing up and down with the motion. "This way," she said, beckoning them to follow.

The little girl set off sprinting across the garden, with Jack and Sally jogging along behind her, until they reached the gnarled old apple tree that had been planted down by the fence. Leta looked up as the three of them approached, her eyes wide with worry. She was crouched down by an obscured figure - a woman - who was lying, shrouded in the long grass, and she rose to her feet as Jack and the two girls came to a halt in front of them.

"Papa Jack," she whispered, glancing back over her shoulder before returning her gaze to him, "She won't wake up."

Jack nodded solemnly, reaching out a hand to place on Leta's shoulder, "It'll be all right, don't worry," he tried to reassure her, wordlessly urging the girls to stand back as he cautiously approached the woman in the grass.

She looked only a few years younger than Jack, dark hair obscuring otherwise beautiful features. He swallowed hard, feeling his heart quicken with worry, when he took in the blood pouring from the ugly head wound the woman was sporting. He swore quietly under his breath and took a handkerchief from his pants' pocket to hold against the wound, in an attempt to stem the flow of blood. It did not look good.

Carefully, he touched the figure's shoulder, shaking it gently in an attempt to rouse her. It had no effect. He tried again, clearing his throat as he called to the woman, "Uh, miss? Miss? Can you hear me, miss?"

He heard Leta's voice, tiny and afraid, "Is she...?"

"Dead?" Masha finished her friend's question, swallowing hard against the word.

Jack hesitated before answering, though he couldn't help but assume the worst. Just then, however, he felt the woman stir beneath his hand and she gave a muffled groan of pain. Masha and Leta both gasped happily and prepared to race forward, but Jack held up a hand - a wordless order for them to stay back. They still didn't know who this woman was, much less where she came from or how she had come to gain her head wound. She was dressed in distinctly upper class garb, telling Jack right away that she wasn't from around these parts.

"Miss, can you hear me?" he tried again, once he saw her eyes flicker.

"Where...?" he heard her say, her voice rough, the rest of her question lost as she let out a hiss of pain.

"It's all right, now, miss. You're safe," Jack reassured her, the white of his handkerchief rapidly turning red the longer he held it to the wound. He needed to get her up into the house; he had medical supplies up there - bandages, morphine. "Miss, can you, uh, can you open your eyes?"

The woman groaned again, her eyes blinking open as blue met green. Her brow seemed to furrow in something akin to confusion as she looked up at him, "Atlas...?" she whispered and Jack almost dropped the handkerchief from her head in surprise.

Atlas. How common a name was that up here, on the surface? He was going to go out on a limb and say not very - and Jack could think of only one way that this woman would know it.

She was from Rapture.

"No," Jack choked out, the mere mention of the name - the name of the man he had trusted, the name of the man who betrayed him, controlled him - incurring flashes of memories in his brain that, despite his best efforts, he could not seem to suppress, "My name is..."

He trailed off when he realized that the woman wasn't looking at him anymore, that her gaze was fixated on something past him. He spared a glance over his shoulder to where the three girls were watching the exchange with wide, terrified eyes - Masha and Leta holding hands, while Sally clutched her doll tightly.

Jack heard the woman gasp, a rattling guttural sound. Her mouth opened and closed as she struggled to find the words to speak.

"S... Sally?" the woman managed, something like a smile working its way onto her lips, before her eyes rolled back into her head and she fell, limp, into Jack's arms.


	2. Chapter 2

When Elizabeth awoke the first thing she became aware of was pain - an intense throbbing, deep and agonizingly persistent in her skull. She shifted where she lay, surprised to find herself entangled in a collection of soft blankets, a generous assortment of pillows propping up her head. She opened her eyes, slowly, her vision frighteningly bleary before - after several moments of blinking away the lingering sleep - it finally settled and she glanced around her curiously. She was in someone's bedroom, she surmised at once, yellow sunlight streaming in through an open window to pleasantly warm her skin.

Wait. Her heart gave a sudden jolt.  _Sunlight_. That meant...

She wasn't in Rapture anymore.

As if to confirm her theory, the twitter of birds trickled into her, chirping their four-note tune from the branches of a tree just outside her window. Gleeful laughter met her ears, accompanied by the steady pound of running footsteps. 'Masha, give that back!' she heard someone cry, in the indignant, demanding tone of a six-year-old girl. Unconsciously, she felt herself groan as she attempted to roll over in the bed, a gasp falling from her lips when she met the curious brown-eyed gaze of a little girl.

Elizabeth pulled back, startled at what she saw, the beginnings of a question (" _Who_ -?") dancing precariously on the tip of her tongue. The little girl, meanwhile, just grinned as she leapt off the chair she was sitting on and bounded out of the room, "Papa Jack, Papa Jack!" Elizabeth heard her call, happily, "She's awake! The pretty lady's awake!"

Elizabeth's brow furrowed and suspicion flooded through her. Biting down on her lower lip to suppress any unbidden sounds of pain, she pushed herself up shakily so she was sitting in the bed, her eyes roving over the room in a desperate attempt to take in her new surroundings - and to search for any weapons she could use, should the situation call for it. There was none. There wasn't much of anything, really - the room, itself, was spartan in its decoration. Other than the bed, the only other items were a wooden dresser, over which hung a small square mirror, and a worn red armchair pushed into the corner.

She heard a male voice, gruff but undeniably kind, reply to the little girl. "Thank you for letting me know, Cathy," it said and she could hear the smile in it as he addressed her, "Now, why don't you go outside and play with the others? I need to see how the lady is."

"OK, Papa Jack!" the girl - Cathy - agreed readily and Elizabeth listened as her footsteps faded out of earshot, followed by the sound of a storm door slamming shut behind her.

Elizabeth glanced up as the floorboards of the room creaked under the weight of a new presence and she exhaled a shuddering breath. The man who had entered the room was tall, maybe only a few years older than herself, with light brown hair and green eyes. He gazed at her with concern and, try as she might, Elizabeth found herself unable to shake the distinct feeling of familiarity that she felt when she looked at him, that - somehow, somewhere - she had met this man before.

"How do you feel?" he asked her, cocking a questioning eyebrow.

"Sore," she replied, honestly.

"Well, you did take a nasty blow to the head," he replied and Elizabeth felt herself reach up, surprised to find her head heavily bound by bandages, "For a while there, we weren't sure if you were going to make it. You were out for almost an entire day."

A day. She had been unconscious for almost  _a whole day_. But how did she-  _Atlas_. She hissed, gritting her teeth against the memory that had risen, terrible and unbidden, from the depths of her mind. The memory of Atlas - that son of a bitch - raising a wrench to her and bringing it down hard on her skull. Her knees had buckled and she had collapsed, blood - startlingly crimson and  _hers_  - trickling down from her temple. But that had been in Rapture, miles beneath the ocean. How had she managed to find her way to the surface, to this man's farm - of all places?

"Miss, do you - ah - do you remember your name?" the man was speaking again, his tone gentle as it brought her up from her reverie.

"Elizabeth," she told him, swallowing as she debated for a split-second on which surname to use, "Elizabeth DeWitt."

"Jack," the man replied, then he paused, just as she did, and Elizabeth was struck by the strange notion that perhaps he, too, was suffering from a similar dilemma as her - a crisis of identity, "Jack Wynand," he finished, eventually.

"Where," Elizabeth looked around her and took a deep breath, "Where am I?"

"Wisconsin," Jack replied.

She swallowed, thickly. She remembered reading about Wisconsin in the various books she'd had to keep her company in the tower, all throughout her formative years. It was in north-central America, bordered by Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois and Michigan. Her blue eyes found him and she fixed him with a penetrating stare, "What year is it?"

Jack blinked at the question and she couldn't help but think that that wasn't exactly what he had been expecting next, but he answered it all the same, in the same gentle tone as before, "1960."

That was two years after she had returned to Rapture to rescue Sally. She glanced down at her hands, a spike of surprise rushing through her when she saw the still intact pinky on her right hand. That meant... she couldn't have opened a tear, but then how...

Of course. The Lutece Device.

Understanding rushed back to her all at once and her eyes grew wide. In Columbia, the mere presence of a Lutece Device had fractured the universe, opening up tears where the seams were weakest. Tears through which Albert Fink had plagiarized his music, through which his brother and Suchong had exchanged their ideas and theories on pair bonding. Maybe - just maybe - having one in Rapture's Silverfin restaurant had served to have the same effect - fracturing the universe - and she just so happened to fall through a weak point. To a farm. In 1960.

Why, of all the possible universes, had she ended up here?

She heard Jack suck in a deep breath and she watched warily as he reached out a hand and pushed the door to the bedroom shut. Outside, the girlish laughter was still loud and joyful and Elizabeth couldn't help but note the small smile Jack wore when he heard it. But then, as the door clicked shut and his gaze met hers, there was a distinct hardness to his features that reminded her bizarrely of Andrew Ryan. She swallowed hard, very much aware of her weakened disposition.

"Ms. DeWitt," Jack said, still standing though a wooden dining chair stood, ready and waiting, by her bed, "When we found you, you... mentioned a name. Atlas. Does that, uh, does that mean anything to you?"

Elizabeth gritted her teeth against the memories it provoked.  _'Are you familiar with the term transorbital lobotomy?_ ' She closed her eyes for a moment, willing them all away before she shook her head slightly, careful not to agitate her injuries, "No," she replied, firmly - perhaps even a little  _too_ firmly, "But, if what you said was true, I was on Death's door when you found me. People are known to say all kinds of things in that state."

Jack was still staring at her intently, his eyes narrowing a fraction and she could tell he was unconvinced, "What do you know about a place called Rapture?"

Elizabeth looked up at him sharply, shocked and unable to hold back the flash of recognition that passed over her features, "What do  _you_  know about Rapture?" she shot back at him, a tad accusingly, her eyebrows raised in sudden disbelief.

Jack gave a mirthless twitch of his lips as he folded his arms across his chest, "More than I would like to."

Again, Elizabeth was struck by the distinct sense of familiarity that hung around the man standing beside her bed but - this time - her mind provided her with more to go on than just a feeling. Flashes of a lighthouse and bathyspheres rising to the ocean's surface, an airplane and the words, three words:  _would you kindly_. She gasped, her world tilting sideways.

_Behind that door, incredibly, I see him._

A man stood on the concrete steps leading up to the looming figure of a lighthouse. When before, his features had been obscured, shadowed by the sun's glare, she could see them clearly now. Light brown hair, green eyes and a kind smile. He crouched, holding out his hand to an unseen person and, after a moment, a tiny hand - girlish and pale - placed itself in his. Through the open window, she heard another shriek of childish laughter.

"You're him," she whispered - half in shock, half in awe - gazing up at Jack as if seeing him for the first time, "The Ace in the Hole."

She watched as something close to recognition flashed over Jack's features and his lips thinned into a narrow line, "How do you...?"

"Atlas. He was the one who did this to me," Elizabeth admitted, reaching up a hand to brush emphatically at the bandages that surrounded her head, "After I..." she stopped, her hesitation palpable as she and Jack just stared at each other for a split-second.

Her gaze dropped guiltily to her hands, clasped atop the bedclothes. She had been the one to retrieve Jack's activation code and, in the brief moment she had been able to see behind the doors, as she felt the icy tendrils of death slowly wrap themselves around her, she had seen just what that code had done to him, how much pain it had caused him. Because of her, because of what she had done. But Elizabeth was weary of lies and secrets and she... she felt as though she owed him this much, "After I got the Would You Kindly phrase back from Suchong."

For a moment, the words seemed to hang in the air between them as Jack digested them and their meaning. Then, he reacted exactly as she expected him to - how she would have, if she had been in his place. Suspicion and anger filled his eyes, along with something oddly akin to fear, though - Elizabeth suspected, from the way he kept glancing toward the open window of the bedroom - it was less fear for himself and more so for the source of the giggling outside.

"You were working...  _with Atlas_?" Jack seethed, his right hand coming down to grip at the chair beside her bed so tightly that his knuckles shone a stark white.

Immediately, Elizabeth was on the defensive. "You don't understand," she countered him, hotly, "I was only helping him so he wouldn't hurt Sally."

For some reason, Jack sobered slightly at her words. Anger drained from his features to be replaced with a steady stream of confusion, "Sally...?"

Elizabeth nodded, "She was a Little Sister. They were going to kill her if I didn't help them,  _I didn't have any other choice_ ," she explained, desperately, watching as Jack took a step backwards, away from her, and blew out a shallow breath from between his teeth.

He ran a hand over his face, features set into a look of comprehension, "That's how you knew her," Jack murmured, more to himself than to her, though she couldn't help the way her ears perked up in interest and confusion.

"What?"

"I - well, I  _think_ I have Sally,  _your_  Sally, here with me. I've been looking after her since we escaped, her and four others," Jack said, at last, and Elizabeth felt like her heart had skipped a beat. Could it be true? Was this why the universe had saw fit to have her fall through a tear, to this time and this place? Was it truly giving her a second chance? "Would you like to see her?"

Jack's question rose her from her musings and she looked up at him with wide eyes. In that moment, she felt like the girl she once was, the girl Booker DeWitt first met in the tower on Monument Island - one full of wonder and hope for the world, not yet inflicted with the near constant cynicism and suspicion she seemed to feel now. "Yes," she whispered, the plea coming out somewhat breathless in her desperation.

He nodded to her once as he disappeared out of the bedroom door and Elizabeth was left listening to the sound of her own erratic heartbeat as his footsteps faded. A moment later, they returned, accompanied by other set of lighter footfalls. She could hear the soft whisper of voices - Jack's low tones and the hearty chatter of a young girl. Elizabeth looked up as the door opened again and in stepped Jack, ushering his companion in after him.

Elizabeth's heart nearly stopped in her chest and, despite herself, she felt tears welling up in her eyes as she gazed down at Sally, lingering by Jack's leg, her fingers gripping the grey fabric of his trousers. Gone was the ethereal glow that marked her as a Little Sister, but it was still her. Blonde hair, blue eyes, her little doll tucked securely under her arm. She was healthy. She was safe. She was  _here_.

She gazed up at Jack, "You saved her," she whispered, her lips twitching up into a grateful smile, "You saved  _them_. Thank you."

"Papa Jack," little Sally glanced from Elizabeth to Jack uncertainly, "Who is she?"

Jack spared Elizabeth the briefest of looks before he stooped to kneel at the young girl's level, "Sally, she says she knows you from... from before," he replied, his tone gentle as he watched her expression, as though trying to gauge a reaction from her.

Sally swallowed, fingers tightening minutely around her doll even at the implicit mention of Rapture, "Oh," was all she said, returning her gaze to Elizabeth, "I don't remember her, Papa Jack."

Elizabeth exhaled a soft sigh, pained by the confusion she saw in Sally's eyes as the little girl tried desperately to sift through her mind in search of a memory. In truth, Elizabeth could not blame her for forgetting. For her, it had been merely hours since their last meeting - for Sally, it had been two years and, even then, she hadn't been herself, her mind addled by months of mental conditioning and the sea slug they'd embedded in her belly.

She could feel Jack's eyes on her and she lifted her head to meet his sympathetic gaze, watching as he reached up a hand to scratch lightly at a spot on the back of his neck, "I... I'm sorry. When I cured them, I didn't know if... if they would..." he trailed off, shaking his head slightly.

"Papa Jack?" Sally's tiny voice brought both of their attentions back to her. She was gazing up at him with a worried look in her eye, as though fearing that she had unintentionally upset him in some way.

Jack must have realized this as he put a reassuring hand on her shoulder and smiled at her slightly, "It's OK, Sally, don't worry. Why don't you, uh, why don't you go back outside and play with the others some more, huh? That game you were playing sure did look like a lot of fun."

She nodded, though both Elizabeth and Jack couldn't help but notice that the little girl's enthusiasm had dimmed substantially. Nevertheless, Jack kept his smile steadfastly in place as he rose from his kneeling position and moved to open the door for her. Elizabeth watched as Sally stole another, backwards glance at her before she took two tiny steps forward, towards the waiting door. Part of her urged her not to let Sally go just yet, to not give up hope so quickly, as - acting on a spike of impulse that had trilled through her - Elizabeth found herself humming a few bars of  _La Vie en rose_.

It was the song that had haunted her throughout her return to Rapture, taunting her with the cruel knowledge that she would never see Paris in all of its glory; it was the song she had heard as she lay dying, sung - soft and disjointed - by Sally as Atlas and his men left her to succumb to her wounds. She wanted to change that. No longer would be it associated with hopelessness and death, she would give it a new meaning, just as she had been granted a renewed chance at life. As the familiar melody filled the silence of the room, Elizabeth watched, in hope, as Sally stilled by her bed, a soft spark of recognition alighting her blue eyes as the tune stirred something long buried.

Sally turned to her, hesitating only for a moment before, carefully, she began to sing along to the tune in a soft unsure voice. Elizabeth beamed at her in approval as she, too, began to add words to her humming, encouraging the uncertain little girl with a gentle nod. It was as the song swelled, before dying down at the close of a chorus, that Sally's face broke into a grin.

"I remember you," she whispered, at last, wrapping her tiny fingers around Elizabeth's, "You... You helped me. Papa Jack, she helped me!"

"That's right," Elizabeth replied, smiling at her as, despite herself, she felt a lump of emotion rise in her throat.

But then, Sally's smile faltered and something clenched, uncomfortably tight, at Elizabeth's heart, "You... You aren't going to go away again, are you?" the little girl asked her, blue eyes wide and suddenly fearful; her grip on the elder girl's hand tightened, as though afraid that if she let it go slack - even for a second - Elizabeth would slip away, never to be seen again.

She was quick to shake her head, intertwining her fingers with Sally's to give her hand a reassuring squeeze, "No, no, Sally - I won't. I promise."

And as the young girl's smile returned to light up her delicate little features, Elizabeth found herself feeling - for the first time in what felt like a long time - very much at peace.


End file.
